Wooden mosaic work



. 1,632,497/ June 14 1927 E. A. NOL` WOODEN MOSAIC WORK Filed Oct. 20, 1925 Patented June 14, 1927.

AUNITED STATES IPATIENT OFFICE.

ERNEST ANTOINE NOL, OF PARIS, FRANCE.

wooDEN Mosaic wonx.

Application led ctober20, 1925, Serial No. 63,713, and in :France Dctober 28, 1924.

Mosaic work consi-sts of a surface covered with small independent parts embedded in a suitable binding matter such as Portland cement or lime to which they are secured bv all faces except one. Such mosaic work which is used for flooring or for wall linings is made with material such as stone ware, marble, glassware and such like which have the drawback of being hard and cold.

come this drawback, to replace such mosaic work by a coating of special magnesiuml cement over a bed of concrete made with Portland cement. This coating adheres strongly to the concrete and can be made to appear yielding and noiseless 1f sc me sawdust is used with it. Such coatings are lmown and have been in use for several years, but their resistance to wear is far smaller than that of the usual tiled floors and itis not possible to give them the varied appearance necessary for a rich decoration.

The object of my inventionA 1s to provlde a flooring or coating which has the advantages of the usual mosaic workv and of the coatings just described without having their drawbacks. In view of this, a number of wooden parts of suitable shape and size, disposed a little apart one from the other, are embedded andsecured in a coating to whlchthey adhere strongly'and which is made preferably. out of a ma nesium. cement mixed with magnesium c loride. The wooden parts are secured to the said coating by all their faces except one, which remains apparent over the coating when the work 1s finished.

These wooden mosaics have the same apmarble or glassware. The coating can be chosen so as to be exactly as hard, yielding and wear-resisting as the Wooden parts according to the kind of wood used.

These mosaics afford also the advantage over ordinary wooden floors that they may remain iu use as long as there is any wood left and the thickness of the wood used can therefore be increased according to the needs whereas the borders of wooden floors must be changed as soon as they are worn down to the groove, that is when only one third of the wood is Worn away.

Moreover the wooden mosaic as described It has been proposed in order to over--y pearance asv those made with stoneware,

is highly sanitary as it shows no hollow joints and no cracks wherein dust might accumulate.

The magnesium cement which can be coloured as desired, helps in giving the floor a decorative appearance and can besides for sanitary and cleaning purposes be extended over the adjacent walls so as to make a round gorge and a plinth round the rooms Hoored with wooden mosaic. The flooring thus described is simple and its puttmg together needs only little handcraft; thus all the usual extra material such as metal strips, nails, grooved fillets, glue, etc., can be done away with, the wooden parts and the sealing material being bound lt) ge]f;her directly so as to form one solid The wooden parts cannot be separated one from the other nor away from the cement because the latter coating is somewhat elastic and also because the visible area of each part is very small and the. joints between the parts are in proportion with the said area and the thickness of the wood. These joints being filled with cement after the mosaic is set down are thus large enough to prevent the wood from moving by holdF ing each part as in pincers; at .the same time the elasticity ofthe cement allows the small movements of the wood which are caused by the action of the air. The breadth of these joints also allows the water of the `sealing cement vto evaporate through the sursame time and in the same manner as the I wood.

The wood used for mosaic fioors should preferably be hard wood such as oak, palissander, colonial woods which must be sound and dried or kiln-dried. The laying down of. the Wooden mosaic in the magnesium cement coating can be done before the cement has set either by laying the wooden parts directly on the coating, or by previously sticking them on a piece of pa er and reversing them afterwards on to t e coating.

For wall linings, it is necessary to provide for sealing wooden wedges. These allow iillets and mouldings of all description to be nailed on to them so as to form a frame round each mosaic panel.

In all cases, the wooden mosaic can be directly secured to boards, panels or partitions in concrete or wood.

Appended drawings show by way of eX- ample several forms of execution of my invention and allow the stages of the `making up of the mosaic to be understood.

Fig. l shows in plan and elevation different shapes whic can be given to the wooden parts. j

Fig. 2 is a part perspective of a series of wooden parts stuck on paper and ready for making upqa panel.

Fig. 3 is a cross section of the block formed by the mosaic when nished.

Fig. 4 shows how the mosaic can be secured to an old wooden floor.

Fio'. 5 illustrates a special method whereby t e wooden parts are stuck to panels (veneered or not).

The parts l (in oak, palissander or similar wood) are given of the shapes shown on Fig. 1 or any other shape which may be suitable in view of the pattern and of the effect to be roduced.

en the mosaic is to comprise ornamented borders or a geometrical pattern, the design is irst drawn on a sheet of paper of the size it is to be carried out at. It must be drawn as seen in a mirror because that face of the wooden parts which is to be apparent is stuck to the paper. The drawing is cut up into panels having an area of about 30 to 40 square decimeters and to which the .workmen stick the wooden parts 1 (Fig. 2). The sticking is made with arabic gum or with liquid deXtrin without any lumps so as to let each part be completely adherent to the paper and the visible surface of all the parts be exactly in the same plane when the mosaic is finished.

Spaces 3 are provided between theseveral parts so as to afford room for the cement joints between the wooden parts. The sides 1.v of latter parts which are to rest on the magnesium cement coating show grooves made by a grooving plane whereas the opposite side stuck to the paper 2 is previously planed by a planing machine so as to be perfectly smooth.

The ground 5 (Fig. 3) on which the iioor is to be laid must be very dry and therefore made about a week before the mosaic is laid. It generally shows as concrete of suitable thickness made out of Portland cement and gravel. No lime may be used for making said concrete. It should be levelled with a levelling plank but not smoothed with the trowel.

should be carefully cleansed and brushed with a metal brush so as to remove all dust or 1plaster particles which may lie on it.

f a greater elasticity is desired, the concretecan in some cases be made with conglomeratedl cork and cement.

A coat-ing of special magnesium cement 6 is then spread over the concrete. The cement is set with water containing magnesium chloride and marking 25 Baume. The coating shouldrbe thick enough to allow it being spread with a trowel. It is then levelled with a levelling plank so as to stop short a little below the level which the floor is to assume, the diiierence corresponding to the thickness of the wooden parts l.

The panels shown on Fig. 2 are then laid and the joints 3 are illed by means of a trowel with a liquid mortar of magnesium cement having the desired colour. This laying is made by reversing the panels, paper uppermost. The panels are laid down one n eXt to the other so as to reproduce the design as given out. The laying should be inished before the coating is too much set.

The wooden parts must be levelled carefully. This can be done by beating the paper which covers them with a veryeven rammer in hard wood or in metal and `very wide so as to cover at the same time the greatest amount possible of wooden parts. The pressure thus exerted on the sealing cement makes the parts adhere completely and at the same time their top surface be perfectly flat under the iniiuence of the rammer, and remain so after the setting.

The paper is taken away with a`wet sponge which is passed over it until it is suiiiciently imbued with water to allow its being taken away easily.

If after the paper is taken away some of the joints 7 (Fig. 3) are not quite full, they should be stopped with magnesium cement by means of a slice. After this there'only remains to plane the mosaic like an ordinary wooden iioor with a carpenters scraper or better with a polishing machine. This second planing is all the more easy as all the parts have their wood libres parallel to the.

direction of the movement of the tool, none of them showing their end grain after the laying.

The little magnesium cement which may appear over the wood can be removed by rubbing with a very fine metal brush, with emery paper or a polishing machine.

When the mosaic is laid down, linseed oil is passed several times over the pavement produced soas to still further diminish the wear of the wooden parts.

As stated hereinbefore, the wooden mosaic can be laid over old wooden iioors in which case (Fig. 4) nails 9 with large heads are y A driven into the old ioor 8, the protruding Before the mosaic is applied the concrete head being embedded in the magnesium cement coating 6 so as to make latter adhere better tothe wood of oor 8.

Finally Fig. 5 shows thin parts 1 of suitable size and shape stuck to panels 10 which may bel veneered or not. The several elements are separated one from the other by joints 11 which are lled with magnesium cement. This arrangement is specially adapted for wall linings, wainscots or furniture decoration'so as to allow the use of hard or tender woods either with their natural colour or tinted, in combination with any suitable ornamental materials such as mother of pearl, preciousV metals or stones and to make up a decoration corresponding with that of the ground.

What I claim is:

An ornamental marquetry comprisingn a support, a layer of magnesium cement thereon andy a number of small Hat-faced arts of suitable shape of ornamental materials and chiefly/of diierent woodsy pressed into and surrounded on all sides except one with the magnesium cement, with only enough oement projecting between said small parts to anchor them and allow'for expansion and contraction caused by atmos heric changes, the cement between said sma l parts having the same degree of resist-ance to wear as the small parts and flush on its exterior surface with the uncovered surfaces of the small parts.

In testimony whereof I have affixed my signature.

ERNEST ANTOINE Noam` 

